People who think that VAT would be a good idea for America ought to take a look at the above chart. In country after country, VAT rates started pretty low, but crept up, up, up (with the strange outlier of France, whose VAT actually declined a bit).

If you're interested in the full VAT rate data, it can be found at the OECD website.

Someone ought to ask President Obama why his Administration has flatly refused to rule out a VAT to pay for socialized medicine. Maybe it's the same reason that Bill Clinton had to float this idea back in 1993 to pay for Hillarycare.